The first funerals for victims of the Sandy Hook primary school shooting have been held in the Connecticut town of Newtown.

Twenty children and six adults died when gunman Adam Lanza opened fire with a military-style assault rifle at their school on Friday.

As the grieving residents of Newtown grapple with the loss of life, funeral services were held for two of the six-year-old victims - Noah Pozner and Jack Pinto.

Noah was the youngest victim of rampage and his twin sister, Arielle, escaped unhurt.

Under chilly, leaden skies, police and bomb-sniffing dogs conducted a precautionary search of the street lined with white balloons outside the funeral home where Noah's brief life was remembered.

A teddy bear and bouquet of white flowers lay at the base of an oak tree outside the service.

"Noah was an impish, larger-than-life little boy," his family said in his obituary in the Newtown Bee newspaper.

"Everything he did conveyed action and energy through love. He was the light of our family, a little soul devoid of spite and meanness," wrote his parents, Lenny and Veronique Pozner, and four siblings.

At Jack's funeral in Newtown, about a half dozen children wearing a wrestling's club gold medals took off the awards and gave them to their team-mate's parents.

A New York Giants fan, Jack was wearing a red-and-white jersey with receiver Victor Cruz's number 80 as he lay in an open white casket at the service.

During Sunday's game, Cruz wore shoes with "RIP Jack Pinto" written on the side.

"Jack was an incredibly loving and vivacious young boy, appreciated by all who knew him for his lively and giving spirit and steely determination," his parents, Dean and Tricia Pinto, and brother said in his obituary in the Newtown Bee.

Active in sports from football to skiing, he was remembered "for the immeasurable joy he brought to all who had the pleasure of knowing him, a joy whose wide reach belied his six short years."

Lieutenant Paul Vance, from Connecticut State Police, says the school remains closed and will be held as a crime scene "indefinitely".

"I don't know how long that will be, I'm suspecting months," he said.

Police say they have found no connection between the gunman and the school, and while they have gathered "significant" evidence from his home, they still will not speculate about a motive.

The children who attended Sandy Hook primary will go to classes at a different school, but not right away.

Police say two teachers who survived the shooting are considered crucial witnesses.

The husband of slain school principal Dawn Hochsprung said his wife had told others around her to hide, then tried to subdue the killer.

"I don't know where that comes from. Dawn was 5'2," George Hochsprung said.

"Dawn put herself in jeopardy and I have been angry about that, angry - until just now, when I met two women that she told to go under shelter while she actually confronted the gunman."

One of the teachers, Janet Balmer, told CNN that when she heard gunshots, she launched into the lockdown routine that the class had recently practiced, then tried to act as if all was well.

"We sat in the cubby away from the door so no one could see us, read them a story and talked to them," she said.

Yesterday US president Barack Obama attended a vigil in Newtown where he told mourners that America had failed its basic task - looking after its children - and said "we will have to change" to avoid more mass shootings.

"Are we really prepared to say that we're powerless in the face of such carnage, that the politics are too hard?" he said.

"Are we prepared to say that such violence visited on our children year after year is somehow the price of our freedom? No single law, no set of laws, can eliminate evil from the world or prevent every senseless act of violence in our society. But that can't be an excuse for inaction."

This morning the White House said it so far had "no specific agenda" to announce on tackling gun violence.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said Mr Obama would engage Americans "in the coming weeks" on a possible approaches.

"I don't have a series of proposals to present to you. The president spoke yesterday about moving forward in the coming weeks," Mr Carney said.

"I don't have a specific agenda to announce to you today. I will simply point you to what the president said last night about moving forward in the coming weeks. I would look for him to do that."

Mr Carney did however say that Obama still supported a reinstatement of the ban on assault weapons ban that expired in 2004, following growing talk in Congress about a bid to renew the measure.

Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein has promised to introduce a bill to ban assault weapons on the very first day of the next Congress, January 3.